Vemund Thoe - Snowblind Friend

Welcome to the third event at Noplace Oslo:


SNOWBLIND FRIEND by VEMUND THOE


11.03.11 – 20.03.11

Opening: Friday 11.03.11, 19.00 – 23.00



Opening hours 14-17, Saturdays and Sundays





All the things one has forgotten scream for help in dreams.” – Elias Canetti


Hallo? / Hallo… Spreche ich Rolf Mengele? / (Sceptical) Wer ist das? / (Fawning) Ich bin Vemund Thoe, ein norwegischer Künstler… / (Still sceptical) Sie sind Fehman Tot? / Nein, VEMUND THOE. / Ja, Fehman Tot… ? / Jaja… sprechen sie englisch herr Rolf Mengele? / (Irritated) Ja, natürlich, ich bin kein Idiot! / Good. As I said, I’m a norwegian artist and I wanted to ask you a few questions… is this a bad time? / If it’s my bed time? / (Loud and slow) NO… IS, THIS, A, BAD, TIME? AM I BOTHERING YOU? / (Curt) What is it you want? / (Loud) I WANT TO ASK YOU A COUPLE OF QUESTIONS? / (Irritated) Please, lower ihre Stimme, I am not def. / Is it ok if I ask them then? / (Confused) Ask who? / No, ask you, the questions? / (Still confused) I don’t habe keine questions… / YES, I KNOW, I WAS WONDERING IF I MIGHT ASK YOU SOME QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR FATHER. / (Stern) You are ruining my Ohren with all your Schreien, Herr Fehman. Ask your questions, but use a normal voice. / Ok, sorry, it’s only that I want to make sure that you hear me right, maybe the phoneline is bad or something… / Was that a question? / If what was a question… ? / What? / Nevermind. Here’s a question: Do you remember your father? / What do you mean: ”If I am a member of the feather”? / NO… DO YOU REMEMBER YOUR FATHER? / How did you know my father? / No, I didn’t, I know of him, of course… I was just curios how it felt to have a nazi war criminal for a father? / … / … / If there is a cure for a criminal feather? (Suspicious) Are you one of those surrealists? Your questions make kein sense. Are you french? / (Slightly amused) No… sorry, I think you’re misunderstanding, I said FATHER… not FEATHER. / … / … / Gut. Kommst du an diesem Wochenende besuchen? Deine Mutter und ich haben dich so lange nicht gesehen. / I’m sorry, in english…? / Der Arzt erzählt mir, ich brauche eine Transplantation des Knies. Haben Sie sprach mit meinem Arzt? Könnten Sie das tun? / (Confused) What? No… dein arse…? I’m… / Why don’t you ever come visit dein Vater nicht mehr? What did I ever do? / I’m not your son, sorry, I think you’re confusing me with… / (Interrupts) Deine Mutter vermisst dich so sehr (crying) / Oh… / (Stern) Death is a scandal. He wouldn’t have it. / Who wouldn’t? / … / Are you still there? / … / Herr Mengele? / Ich bin nicht interessiert. / (Click!) / … /


1) A painted portrait of Josef Mengele (known for his sadistic medical experiments on the prisoners of Auschwitz during World War II). 2) A hypnotherapeutic session, where the subject is drugged with Penthotal so that the therapist can better penetrate the unconscious of his patient. 3) The documentary film ”Chariots of the Gods” (based on the book ”Chariots of the Gods?” by Erich von Däniken), which claims there to be evidence that most human civilizations contain traces of extra-terrestrial origins. All these being, in their own right, examples of lapses in science’s pretensions to soundness, verifiability and ethical conduct. This inherent fallacy in the agency of science – whether it takes the form of some mad nazi-doctor hiding his transgressions behind a pseudo-medical argument; the tendentious nature of psychotherapeutical treatment and its assumption of an ”unconscious” faculty in the human brain; or popular science giving in to the temptation to project unambiguously on the ambiguous and concoct magical explanations – it testifies to the uncorrigible presence of the irrational in any human enterprise, no matter how ardently the majority of its proponents adheres to reason.

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